BLM proposes cutting public comment time on its major land plans from 90 days to 30

The Bureau of Land Management proposed Monday to cut the time the public gets to weigh in on its major land plans from at least 90 days to 30, with the option of 30 more.

The change is part of a broad rewrite of the rules for how the agency plans the future of public land across the West and Alaska. It would also make full environmental reviews of those plans optional and shorten the time states get to raise objections. National and Western conservation groups criticized the proposal Monday.

The plans, called resource management plans, set the rules for public land, often millions of acres at a time: where mining, drilling, roads and other development can go, and which places are set aside for wildlife, water or cultural sites.

In Alaska, BLM oversees about 70 million acres. The rule wouldn't cover the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska on the North Slope, which falls under a different law.

One recent plan in Alaska covered 13.3 million acres along the Yukon River and the Dalton Highway. It was "the product of more than a decade of discussion and input from the public, Tribes, cooperating agencies, and stakeholders," BLM said when it approved the plan in November 2024.

Congress voted to overturn it less than a year later. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the plan had "unnecessarily restricted access to millions of acres of Alaska," and that throwing it out would let BLM "develop a more balanced plan," according to a statement after the Senate vote.

The Interior Department says the planning rules, first written in 1979, are outdated. "The current planning process is too slow, too complicated and weighed down by outdated requirements," BLM Director Steve Pearce said in an announcement. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said public lands "should be managed by the people closest to the land, not held back by outdated bureaucracy in D.C."

In the proposed rule, BLM says a 90-day minimum is more than double what federal environmental review rules used to require, and is a burden now that federal law gives agencies two years to finish an environmental impact statement. It says the change would let it tailor public involvement to each plan.

Here's what else would change:

• Meetings instead of written comments. BLM could hold a public meeting or hearing in place of a written comment period in some cases. Its example is making a parcel as small as a half-acre available for disposal, which it calls "generally only of interest to the highly localized community."

• Environmental reviews. BLM would no longer have to prepare an environmental impact statement every time it writes or revises a plan, though it still could.

• Protected areas. A separate 60-day comment period on proposed areas of critical environmental concern, places flagged for special protection, would end.

• States and towns. A governor's review for conflicts with state plans would drop from 60 days to 30. Local government officials would get a new 30-day review of their own.

• Tribes. BLM would drop a requirement to keep its plans consistent with tribal plans, though it would still coordinate with tribes and keep track of tribal plans provided on time.

• Protests. People would still get 30 days to protest a proposed plan before it's approved, but only online. BLM would stop accepting protests by mail.

• Emergencies. For plan changes needed to handle an emergency, a Senate-confirmed official in the Interior secretary's office could shorten public participation timelines, or waive either public notice or the protest period, but not both.

BLM says it will email all 575 federally recognized tribes and about 200 Alaska Native corporations to offer consultation on the proposal.

Public comments are due Jan. 9.